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Help, they stole system.

How long does it take for the police to get a supenoa from a judge? So centurylink can hand over the logfiles to the police? Reason I ask, my girlfriend's work was broken into and they stole a very expensive touchscreen computer. Good news they have logme in software on the stolen system. Also, we have there IP address which traces back to Centurylink which is are local provider here in Fort Myers.

It has already been six days now. And still waiting. Also, do you guys have any ideas how we can see who it is, for example surfing habits, facebook, myspace, sites visited etc,,. (there is no webcam) when we try logmein it will popup on the remote system and we do not want to alert them and let them know we are on to them.

Any ideas how to show proof who did this? Can we copy any system files/folders/etc... anything to see who stole our system? If so, please let me know. The system is already registered at stolencomputers.org and I called the manufacture (Sony) and let them know in case they try switching information. All help is greatly appreciated. They broke into the business and stole this stuff. Such low lives.

Why should they even bother? surely suitably notarised or witnessed written authority would be adequate? After all you are the victim and they are your records, even though you do not keep them? (over here "obstruction" of the police in the course of their duties is a felony offence).

AFAIK "Logme in" is still just an application that allows remote access to a host or server machine. It isn't security software and needs the client to initiate the session.

Is this a client machine, or the server; and is it a laptop or a tower? With the setups I use, the server cannot initiate a session, as it doesn't know my IP address. I can see a problem where the server connects to the ISP via a router...........it will use an internal IP address (at least that's what mine does), and the router holds the common IP address supplied by the ISP. There is no way the ISP can tell which machine is being used, who is using it, or where it is located; although it would be reasonable to assume that it is within cat5e/RJ45 or WiFi range.

Obviously there are applications that are more suited to this security scenario. Typically, they quietly phone home every so often and check to see if they have been stolen.

I would guess that remote support software is somewhere inbetween, but still has the problem that you don't know the IP address of the stolen device.

All this is academic though as this was a doctors' surgery, so the perps were probably after drugs, and will have offloaded the machine by now.

"Freddie the fence" (my local handler of stolen electronics) always uses DBAN and wipes the machines when he gets them. That gets rid of all of the evidence apart from serials, and reduces any potential offence to receiving rather than burglary or theft, which carry much heavier sentences.

In all probability the machine has been wiped, rebuilt and shipped out of state by now. Or they have realised they cannot safely dispose of it locally and tossed it in a river or lake; having removed the easily disposed of and untraceable components.

Yeah, there are "chopshops" for computers as well

I would advise against attempting to contact the machine, as that will contaminate the evidence. Best leave it to law enforcement if they are interested.

My PC has a built in security chip, he wouldn't be able to access the bios or the hard drive without the password. I'd probably never see my pc again if it got stolen

That's pretty much guaranteed. The general idea of that sort of security is to deter theft, as the thief would know that they couldn't use the machine. And even that assumes that they have time to inspect it carefully first?

The flaw is that most casual thieves don't know anything about computers anyway. By the time they discover that it is unusable, it is way too late. They will either toss it, or break it for parts that they can sell.

Alternatively they are more professional thieves who have an outlet who will just re-chip it.